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Despite growing excitement around the transformative potential of quantum computing, leaders in many industries are still unfamiliar with the technology that’s likely to prove more disruptive than Artificial Intelligence and blockchain. This ignorance seems particularly acute in industries that deal with physical systems and commodities. In an informal survey of two dozen executives in transportation, logistics, construction and energy, only eight had heard of quantum computing and only two could explain how it works.

In many ways this lack of awareness is understandable. Quantum computing’s value to our digital infrastructure is obvious, but its value to our physical infrastructure is perhaps less evident. Yet, the explosion of power and speed that quantum computers will unleash could indeed have a profound impact on physical systems like our transportation and utility networks. For companies, municipalities and nation states to stay competitive and capture the full benefit of the quantum revolution, leaders must start thinking about how quantum computing can improve our infrastructure.

Unlike classical computers, in which a bit of information can be either a zero or a one, quantum computers are able to take advantage of a third state through a phenomenon known as superposition. Superposition, which is a property of physics at the quantum scale, allows a quantum bit or qubit to be a zero, a one or a zero and a one simultaneously. The result is an astronomical increase in computational capacity over existing transistor-based hardware. Google, for example, has found that its quantum machines can run some algorithms 100 million times faster than conventional processors.

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His AI-based tool hopes to improve survival rates that are extremely low.

It’s offering 80 minutes alone with a robotic sex doll.

Some say the proliferation of sex robots could lead to less demand for prostitution, but not all agree.

Stephen Baxter collaborates with i4is on AI for interstellar travel — Andreas Hein and Stephen Baxter explore the potential of artificial intelligence for interstellar exploration and colonization in a brand-new arXiv preprint (Image: Adrian Mann)

https://arxiv.org/abs/1811.06526

A startup called HyperSurfaces wants to completely change how you interact with the physical world — and based on some recently released demo videos, it might just meet that lofty goal.

The London-based startup recently unveiled a new technology that can transform any object into a user interface. Essentially, this tech lets you communicate with a computing system using virtually anything you like as a conduit — a glass wall, a car door, even a metal clothes rack — and it has the potential to end our reliance on keyboards, buttons, and touch screens forever.

In a collaborative study presented by scientists primarily affiliated with Stanford and Brown Universities, participants suffering from significant paralysis were successfully able to use non-modified applications on an Android tablet using their brain waves. In previous studies, “point-and-click” computer functionality interpreted from these kinds of signals has been accomplished, but the applications available to participants was limited to software and devices that had been specialized and personalized for users’ specific needs. This study has demonstrated technology that overcomes this limitation and enables access to the full range of software available to non-disabled users. Participants enjoyed applications previously unavailable to them such as streaming music services and a piano keyboard player.

To accomplish the study’s objectives, scientists capitalized and combined existing technologies for their unique end. Brain waves from participants’ brain implants were sent to a commercially available recording system and then processed and decoded by an existing real-time interpreter software. The decoded data was then transmitted to a Bluetooth interface configured as a wireless mouse which was paired to an Android tablet. While the steps to accomplish the task at hand are many, the result somewhat resembles telepathy but largely resembles greater accessibility for the disabled.

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The US is investing in robotics and artificial intelligence as it races against China to develop the weapons of the future. The FT’s US foreign policy and defence correspondent Katrina Manson visits the US Army Research Lab to meet the scientists working on the latest tech developments.

For more video content from the Financial Times, visit http://www.FT.com/video

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In recent years, a brain-computer interface (BCI) developed by the US BrainGate consortium has allowed people to control a robotic arm and to type, using only their thoughts. Now, a group of paralyzed volunteers has utilized the technology to perform various functions on a tablet.

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“Artificial Intelligence is not just a large part of a technological revolution, it’s a major part of a human evolution of going beyond the limits of an environmentally programmed human biological operating system.”

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